Tivoli Storage Flashcopy Manager for Windows - Tips to implement retry capability to FCM offload backup Cloud & Smarter Infrastructure IBM Japan Rev.1 2013 IBM Corporation
Abstract Tivoli Storage Flashcopy Manager (FCM) 3.2 provides function to offload backup to TSM But the retry capability in case of backup failure is not provided with the standard function This document provides tips to implement retry capability to FCM offload backup
There are two ways to deploy Offload Backup Use FCM and TSM standard function FCM and TSM provides offload backup as one of its standard function Offload backup is executed with one click or one command Very easy to setup. Custom offload backup by remote mount Flashcopy and offload backup designed separately Use mount backup to remote computer function provided by FCM Development required for FCM and backup software combination. 2013 IBM Corporation
Offload backup with FCM and TSM Standard Function Production Server 1. Start backup as Both or TSM FCM Offload Backup Server TSM Client 1.3. Offload backup TSM Server IBM VSS 1.1. VSS & Flashcopy IBM VSS 1.2. Host mapping Disk Subsystem Flashcopy 1.4. Off host mapping This feature is provided by IBM All done with one command or one click from FCM
Pros and Cons of Standard Function Pros Can be set up by Configuration Wizard Operation is very easy Backup executed with one click or one command Integrated Management of TSM backup by FCM console Cons Not enough retry capability in case of backup failure Image Backup support only
Custom Offload Backup by Remote Mount Production Server 1. Start backup as Local 2. Start fcmcli mount backup with /remotecomputer option FCM 4. Star fcmcli unmount backup Offload Backup Server FCM TSM Client 3. Start offload backup TSM Server IBM VSS 1.2. VSS & Flashcopy IBM VSS 2.1. Host mapping Disk Subsystem Flashcopy 4.1. Off host mapping Control is needed for job combination
Pros & Cons of Custom Offload Backup Pros Capable of customizing each job e.g. implement high retry capability in case of offload backup failure Can use any command of TSM for offload backup Can use backup software other than TSM Cons Need to control each job Management offload backup by offload backup software
Comparing the Retry Capability Standard Function When offload backup fails, FCM does not retry In order to retry, you can set a retry command to the backup script kicked by FCM scheduler Note: In this case, backup process will start from flashcopy. i.e. you can not restart offload backup only. Offload backup is not continued even if TSM BA client for offload backup is configured in Microsoft Failover Cluster Custom Offload Backup by Remote Mount When offload backup fails, you can configure it to retry offload backup only Enable to handling error on case by case In the case of TSM BA client for offload backup is configured in Microsoft Failover Cluster, you can restart from remote mount
Where backup are initiate from Standard Function From FCM using scheduler provided by FCM Enable to customize the script kicked by FCM Custom Offload Backup by Remote Mount Job Scheduler such as Tivoli Workload Scheduler would be best TSM Scheduler would not be suitable because of complex event handling If you plan to use Windows Task Scheduler, it would be better to make the production server to be the initiator of backup rather than the backup server
Requirement of Custom Offload Backup FCM is installed to Production server and Backup server Hardware provider supports transportable snapshots Option To import VSS snapshots only when needed is set to YES on both server Remote Windows PowerShell needs to be enable on both server